We’ve got a Summertime BLOOD MATCH between two of the titans in the industry. In one corner we have Sucker Punch’s long awaited PS4 title Ghost of Tsushima, and in the other we have a new entry in Nintendo’s hit or miss RPG Paper Mario franchise, The Origami King. Xbox also exists. WHO WILL WIN AND BE CROWED QUEEN OF THE SUMMER…I MEAN KING; KING!

Top Releases:

Ghost of Tsushima (PS4) – Releases Jul. 17^th

It’s been six years since developer Sucker Punch has put out a game (2014’s Infamous double whammy, Second Son and First Light), and 11 years since they released a new franchise. Ghost of Tsushima is an open world, third-person action game that will have you playing as Jin Sakai, one of the last samurai warriors on the island of Tsushima. Taking place in the year 1274 during the first Mongol invasion of Japan, you will take on quests and aid the island’s inhabitants, all in an attempt to stop the Mongol empire from reaching mainland Japan. While stealth is a key feature of the game, as well as duels, I don’t expect this to be as difficult as From Software’s brutal Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, as it is a big budget, first party Sony title that needs to appeal to a broad audience. One cool feature that has film buffs excited is the “Kurosawa Mode”, which tries to recreate the look for Kurosawa’s classic films Sanjuro and Seven Samurai. This isn’t just a straight up “black and white” filter, the team at Sucker punch actually tried to do a visually comparable color palette, as well as add curvature to the image to give it the same kind of look, and even went so far as to tweak the audio to make it sound like you’re hearing the audio from an old 1950’s television or radio speaker. The mode has the blessing of the Kurosawa family, so it must be pretty damn impressive to get that kind of endorsement. If you’ve just finished The Last of Us Part II (or you stayed away due to one of its many controversies), be sure to grab this next PS4 exclusive, that is unless you prefer things a little lighter, which in that case, may I present to you…

Paper Mario: The Origami King (Switch) – Releases Jul. 17^th

Nintendo gave all of us a pretty big shock just a couple months ago when they announced a brand new Paper Mario game. Titled The Origami King, this latest entry in the long running franchise finds our plucky plumber taking on a host of evil, origami folded baddies. As is par for the course in these games, Princess Peach is once again kidnapped, Bowser is thwarted by the new menace and must join up with Mario, and Luigi just sits around doing nothing. Fans and critics have been a sour on the series for a while, and pre-release buzz says this isn’t much better, but its got Mario, and its by Nintendo, so it’ll still sell a ton of copies and we’ll still never get Mother 3.

Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town (PC/Switch) – Releases Jul. 14^th

Eagle eye’d readers might look at this trailer and say, “Hey, isn’t this Harvest Moon? Why is it called Story of Seasons?“. Well, visually acute patron of this column, this comes down to two companies parting ways and both claiming ownership of the same property. Natsume claims ownership of the name Harvest Moon, and have been putting out (according to fans) sub par entries in the series that do not live up to the name. Marvelous! is the owner of the game design and IP, so everything you loved about Harvest Moon is here under this new moniker, Story of Seasons. “Why Story of Seasons?” you might be wondering, well, that’s what the series is called in Japan, so now we’ve got one uniform series name between both regions, but because Natsume still knows there is value in the name Harvest Moon, they’re content to churn out titles with that name so that gullible people buy them. Hey, maybe you really like the Natsume produced Harvest Moon games, and that’s great, but if you really want “Harvest Moon” then get Story of Seasons (although their Doraemon game from a couple years ago is a real snoozer, so maybe keep that in mind).

Beyond A Steel Sky (PC) – Releases Jul. 16^th, recently released on Apple Arcade

Developer Revolution Software was an up and coming game developer in the early 90’s and had an modest hit with their first title, 1992’s point & click adventure Lure of the Temptress. Following on the success of that game, the team decided to move out of fantasy and head into the sci-fi realm, releasing Beneath a Steel Sky in 1994. An even bigger critical and commercial success, the team continued to work in the point & click realm, releasing their most popular title to date, 1996’s Broken Sword: Shadow of the Templars. While Temptress and Steel Sky had been successful, Broken Sword is what put the company on the map, and they would devote the next several years making sequels to this IP (with various detours to pay the bills). During development of their latest Broken Sword title, The Serpent’s Curse, it was announced that their next game after this would be the long awaited sequel to Steel Sky, which in the ensuing years had become a cult classic. Set ten years after the events of the first game, Beyond a Steel Sky finds protagonist Robert Foster returning to the cyberpunk themed Union City. Your return isn’t just for fun, however, you’re on the job, looking for a missing child who is believed to have been kidnapped and taken to Union City. The game continues Revolution’s commitment to the point & click adventure genre, and will have you talking to various characters and collecting items in your search for the missing child. Expect plenty of social commentary on AI, Utopian societies, and all the other stuff you’d expect from a sci-fi, cyberpunk world.

Superhot: Mind Control Delete (PC/PS4/Xbox One) – Releases Jul. 16^th

2016’s Superhot was a bit of a surprise hit when it first came out. Taking influence from Max Payne and The Matrix, Superhot is a first person shooter with a unique gameplay style; the game only moves when you do. What does that mean? Well, unless your character is moving, the world around you stands perfectly still. Enemies will not move or shoot unless you take a step, allowing you to chart your course before hand and set it up so that you can take out your enemies with precision strikes. The second title in the series was a VR conversion that featured new levels and gameplay elements, and now we have the third entry in the series, Mind Control Delete. Originally released into early access in 2017, the game is now out of the over and ready for consumption. Anyone who buys a copy of the first Superhot before July 16th will get this title for free, so if you’re reading this on Tuesday the 14th, you’ll have two days to qualify for your copy (otherwise you can buy it separately or as part of a bundle).

 

Ports and Re-releases:

Death Stranding (PC) – Releases Jul. 14^th

Hideo Kojima’s first game after leaving Konami was divisive, to say the least. Some players found joy in the art of delivering packages across a hostile landscape, while others found the game to be a meaningless slog with no gameplay. It took me a while to get into this game and really understand the message Kojima was trying to bring us, and being stuck at home for the past few months has only made the theme of this game stronger, in my opinion. Funny enough, it took my playing The Last of Us Part II to really appreciate this game, because while LoU2 is about a world tearing itself apart after a global pandemic, Death Stranding is about bringing it back together, against all odds. If you skipped this title on PS4 when it came out last November I would highly encourage you to give it a try now, it’s likely going to be one of the most important games released this generation.

Halo 3 – The Master Chief Collection (PC) – Releases Jul. 14^th

Microsoft continues to add titles to their Master Chief Collection at record pace, and I have no doubt that they’ll get to Halo 4 well before the release of the Series X and Halo: Infinite this Fall. If you are one of the few people left on the planet who hasn’t played Halo 3, well prepare yourself for a wild and bump ride. Initially the game was seen as the end of Master Chief’s story, which should clue you in on how it ends. Alas, our favorite Spartan would eventually return, and Halo 3 would just be another (quite good) entry in a now long running, slightly stale, franchise.

Everything else:

Neon Abyss (PC/PS4/Switch/Xbox One) – Releases Jul. 14^th

Rocket Arena (PC/PS4/Xbox One) – Releases Jul. 14^th

VOID TRRLM(); //VOID TERRARIUM (PS4/Switch) – Releases Jul. 14^th

Waifu Uncovered (Switch) – Releases Jul. 16^th, recently released on PC

Death Come True (PC) – Releases Jul. 17^th, recently released on Switch and mobile devices

Notable Releases from 10, 20 and 30 years ago:

This section is called “Notable Releases”, but I can’t say that any of these three are going to end up in the history books as being some of the most cherished or acclaimed titles of all time. That being said, each one offers some solid fun, despite some setbacks. Let’s get on with it, shall we?

DeathSpank (PS3/Xbox 360) – Released Jul. 13^th/14^th, 2010: Wiki Link

Game developers Ron Gilbert, best known for his classic point & click adventure series The Secret of Monkey Island, and Clayton Kauzlaric, best known for his work on Voodoo Vince, worked together on comic in the mid 2000’s called Grumpy Gamer. This collaboration led to the creation of the character DeathSpank, a over eager, dimwitted, hero who is in search of “The Artifact”. Taking a shine to their creation, Gilbert and Kauzlaric shopped the character around to various studios, hoping to get a 3d action game created. For four years the duo would pitch their ideas, and finally, after meeting with the team at Hothead Games, the two men would finally receive the greenlight to make the game. Eventually the title would morph into a Diablo-esque dungeon crawler, yet much, much sillier. Gilbert had an idea to make the game episodic, telling the story of DeathSpank over several small chapters, however this idea was eventually abandoned in favor of a full release, only to have that decision altered yet again when the game became too big for the Xbox Live Arcade (can you believe there used to be caps on digital download sizes). Gilbert would opt to turn the first act of the game into the self titled DeathSpank, with plans to release acts 2 and 3 a few months down the line as Thongs of Virtue. Critical reception to the game was positive, with many reviewers stating that the humor and writing were strong points, with yet more praise given for the variety of enemies you would encounter and the bizarre and outlandish weapons combinations you could make. There were some problems, however, with some critics finding the quests you are given to be rather generic, consisting mostly of “fetch this and bring it back” missions. Some critics wanted more of the trademark Ron Gilbert puzzle solving and were a bit let down at how simple everything was. After releasing both DeathSpank titles in 2010, Ron Gilbert would leave Hothead Games to make The Cave over at Double Fine, having no involvement with the third entry in the series, The Baconing. In the ensuing years Hothead would transition into making mobile games, Gilbert would release both The Cave and Thimbleweed Park, and Clayton Kauzlaric would join Microsoft Game Studios as a creative director. DeathSpank came and went rather quickly, a mere footnote in the history of gaming, however I gotta say, that footnote is really fun to play.

Threads of Fate (PlayStation) – Released Jul. 19^th, 2000: Wiki Link

Squaresoft’s “Summer of Adventure” was in full effect with the release of Vagrant Story and Legend of Mana, both classics in their own right, and then Threads of Fate came out. Okay, I don’t want to go too hard on this game because it is kind of fun, and it does have some cute characters and moments, but there is one major point that drags this game way down. I’m not sure what was in the air at the time, but it seems to me that developers in Japan were getting a bit tired or bored with the status quo JRPG. By the year 2000, pioneers of the genre ,Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy, were over a decade old. The idea of walking around an overworld map, getting into random battles, and fighting in a turn based system might have seemed stale to them, so why not shake things up? Vagrant Story subverted the genre, Legend of Mana did too, so what could Threads of Fate add to the equation? The answer, platforming; but not just normal jumping from one to the other, no, no, there are also puzzles involved with the jumping. This might not sound that bad, who doesn’t love a good platformer, but your answer is in the question itself. The platformer is only loved if its good, and Threads of Fate has some of the worst platforming controls I’ve ever encountered. Making precision jumps is par for the course in titles like Super Mario 64, most of us can do them with our eyes closed, but that’s because Nintendo iterates and iterates on their controls, getting them to feel so smooth that it’s almost no effort to play their games. Threads of Fate must have had zero time in testing, because moving around in this game is like being stuck in molasses. I must have spent an hour trying to jump from one moving platform the other, in a very particular order; it was agony. To hear that this game was directed by a man with zero interest in action games is completely believable, because there is no way that anyone who is used to running and jumping in a game would have allowed this shit to exist. What’s shocking to hear is that this game designed for children in mind, but what kid is going to take the time to precisely jump from one tiny platform to another, children don’t have that kind of patience. The game received mixed reviews when it came out, with most of the praise going to the (for the time) fantastic graphics, as well as the likable characters. The game seemed to have been received better in Japan than North America, however sales weren’t quite good enough to warrant a sequel, which was cancelled partway through development. This is currently available on the PlayStation network for your PS3, PSP, and PS Vita if you’re dying to play it. Just be warned, though. It’s not going to be a fun ride.

ESWAT: City Under Siege (Genesis) – Released Jul. 13^th, 1900: Wiki Link

Still trying to find its niche, Sega spent most of the Genesis’ first year porting several of its arcade titles to the console in an effort to appeal to the teenagers who frequented the little neon dungeons. Cyber Police ESWAT was a moderately successful arcade machine when it released in 1989, clearly inspired by Sega’s own Shinobi and Namco’s Rolling Thunder. When it came time to port the game, Sega called on the arcade game’s developer to work on it, which meant he was splitting his time between this and another Genesis game, Columns. All in all, the game is fairly uneventful and bland. There’s some fun to be had here, for sure, but overall there just isn’t a whole lot to say about this game. While it is admittedly cool to see your character power-up over the course of the game, its entire presentation is generic. The game never really gives off enough “cool” vibes to make it a cult classic, but I also don’t think it’s so bad that it wouldn’t be worth your time. Aside from emulation, the game is pretty tough to come by, however it is part of Sonic’s Ultimate Genesis Collection for PS3 and Xbox 360, which you can find online for pretty cheap. If you do end of playing this title I would recommend not setting your expectations too high. It’s fun, but not that fun.

Here’s those ducks:

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